The late Carl Sagan said, “Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.”

It’s a sentiment you may experience when you look at images taken by Dennis Mammana, a renowned sky photographer who lives in Borrego Springs. Mammana’s work inspires the sort of wonder about the universe that so deeply moved Sagan.

Mammana, who writes the weekly astronomy column published in The San Diego Union-Tribune, has spent years photographing the cosmos, training his cameras on delights as different as the aurora borealis and Comet Hyakutake.

He’s also written six books, and he teaches and gives lectures. If you’re serious about learning astronomy, you may want to attend “Introduction to Desert Stargazing,” an eight-hour class he’ll teach at the Anza-Borrego Desert State Park Visitor Center on Dec. 11, starting at 1 p.m. You can learn more at